Short Summary

Leaders of France's Socialist and Communist electoral alliance met in Paris on Friday (21 May) to try to reach agreement on a joint approach to next year's municipal elections.

Description

Leaders of France's Socialist and Communist electoral alliance met in Paris on Friday (21 May) to try to reach agreement on a joint approach to next year's municipal elections.

The parties will not be standing against each other as they have done traditionally. They will contest the elections as a union of the Left and not under separate party tickets.

Friday's meeting was the first for 11 months between he three major Left wing groups, the Socialists under Francois Mitterrand, the Communists under Georges Marchais and the Left Radicals whose leader is Robert Fabre.

The Left-wing alliance hopes to stage next year's municipal elections as virtually a dress rehearsal for the 1978 National Assembly elections.

M. Mitterrand told journalists later the discussions between the leaders were "not particularly difficult ... the conversation was relaxed". The main question had been one of "harmonisation", he said.

The meeting of the three parties came after a Socialist Party conference in Dijon the previous weekend, which accepted the principle of joint candidates, originally a Communist proposal.

SYNOPSIS: The Palais Bourbon in Paris where France's three major Left-wing groups met on Friday to discuss joint tactics for next year's municipal elections.

The parties hope to reach agreement in time for the elections, which they see as a dress rehearsal for the 1978 National Assembly elections.

The three parties, the Socialists, the Communists and the Left Radicals, will not be standing against each other as they have done traditionally.

The three groups will contest the elections as a union of the Left and not under separate party tickets.

Friday's meeting came after a Socialist Party conference at Dijon the previous weekend, at which the party accepted the principle of joint candidates, originally a Communist proposal. Socialist leader M. Francois Mitterrand told newsmen later that talks between the leaders were "relaxed". He said the main question had been one of "harmonisation". Relations between the party leaders appeared better than when they last met, in June last year.